The Ruling Class

It seems to me it is pretty important to understand just who the ruling class is. It also ought to be pretty straightforward; but it seems it isn't.

I recently mentioned to a left-leaning friend of mine that he and I were members of the ruling class. He reacted badly. In fact, he wrote that I “had a lot of gall” to suggest such a thing of him.

If I was right in saying so, it is odd that he would not know it. But it is even odder, surely, that he would consider the thing an insult. That's surpassingly strange, surely, and suggests immediately that somebody here has things upside down.

Why did I say we were both members of the ruling class? Because we were both well-educated professionals. But perhaps my friend, being a leftist, might have misunderstood. He might have thought I was saying he was a member of the class _Marx_ claimed to be the ruling class: the hated, grubby, money-soiled, lower-class bourgeoisie. After all, besides being a well-educated professional, he was awkwardly also independently wealthy thanks to inheriting part-ownership of a family firm, and also previously owned his own separate profitable national company.

When it comes to an opiate for the intellectuals, Marx is the great enabler—by conjuring up an imaginary ruling class of rich bourgeoisie, a “them,” the real ruling class can exploit and oppress at will without objection, and, even better, without guilt. Just getting a little of their own back from “them.” Even better when the bogus ruling class is a group traditionally looked down on by the real ruling class as far beneath them.

It all looks like a clever and deceitful plan; except that people aren't really that clever, in groups. Everyone is just buying in, as most people mostly do, to the nearest comfortable lie when it is offered, rather than seeking truth. Maybe even Marx himself. When these things look organized, it is not because of some Bavarian Illuminati, it is because the Devil is indeed an independent intelligence. Marxism just happened to be available for the purpose—but, you will note, it is so useful that it is being clung to by the real ruling class long after it has been objectively disproven, for that reason.

The ruling class never changes. It used to never be any secret at all who the ruling class was. The ruling class is, was, and no doubt forever shall be, the educated class. The desk workers, aka “bureacrats,” aka “professionals.”

A Medieval scribe.

When, on the cusp of the French Revolution, the Estates General were summoned by the king for new powers of taxation, we all know that the Third Estate comprised both the bourgeoisie and the common people; but who was the First Estate?

The aristocracy? The Wealthy landowners? Wrong. They were still only number two. The First Estate was the clergy.

Now, don't imagine that, in pre-modern terms, “clergy” meant only those who presided at religious services. “Clergy” in those times meant more or less anyone who could read, write, and keep sums. The big landowners generally couldn't; they could rarely even sign their name. It is worth noting that Prince Charles, not yet king, is the first ever in line for to the British throne with a university education. In these days, moreover, a university degree automatically came with a clerical gown and ordination. All desk-bound or “clerical” work was, as the word implies, done by “clergy,” “clerks,” “clerics.”

That is, the First Estate was the estate, broadly, of knowledge workers; of what we would today call “professionals.”

And they, of course, were the people who actually ran the government, and all the big estates, and all the businesses, all along, regardless of who held ownership. This was necessarily so, since only they knew how.

As in Europe, so too anywhere else in the world. Indeed, the Indian system is the best one to look at for clarity, because it is in India that the system of class or caste is most socially prominent, public, and articulated. Who were and are the highest caste in India? Not the rajahs, who are from the warrior class, the ksatriyas or big leandowners. Certainly not the bourgeoisie, the merchant class, the Vaidyas. It is the Brahmins—the knowledge workers—who emerged out of the head of Brahma. All other castes emerged from his body; only the Brahmins can claim his consciousness.

Who, in turn, are the acknowledged powers in China? In China, historically, there was little room for any landed aristocracy; all land legally belonged to the Emperor. All government power was in the hands of the Mandarinate, the learned class.

Chinese mandarins.

As in all things, seemingly, the New Testament gets this right. In ancient Palestine, whom do Jesus and John the Baptist consistently target and rail against as the as oppressors of the common people? Not the Roman procurator—his position seems almost ceremonial. Not the Roman centurions, nor the tax collectors, who are portrayed as only doing a job. The real power over the average man is obviously wielded by the scribes and Pharisees—the educated class: the professional teachers and those who made a living from their ability to read and write. The Sadducees, a professional priestly class, also figure in prominently, as a sort of upper bureacracy: in modern terms, doctors and scientists as opposed to mere teachers or accountants.

You can find the same ruling class even among hunter-gatherers—as soon as there is any possibility of class at all, the learned class immediately assumes its place of privilege. Most tribes have two distinct leaders: a war leader, and a “medicine man,” who, as the name implies, is the all-purpose professional. He keeps the tribal records and laws, presides at all rituals, tallies up ownerships, and functions if needed as a doctor as well.

In other words, Marx was completely wrong on his two main points: first, in who the ruling class was, and second, in claiming that the ruling class changes over time.

Is the same class ruling over us today? You bet. Suppose, today, some family makes it good in the family business: what is most often their fondest hope? Is it that their son or daughter, too, may become a successful businessperson, although perhaps on a larger scale? Not usually; their hope is that he may move up into the professions. Even Lord Thompson of Fleet, having made it bigger in business than most could imagine, insisted that his son Ken had to attend Cambridge. That was real success. The working class? Every group of workers if they can strives to form themselves, and be recognized, as a “profession.” Who is striving to be recognized as a shopkeeper or a bourgeois? Professionals, brahmins, of course look down on businessmen, on the “greedy” bourgeoisie, as they always have; just as, but even more than, they always looked down on those blustering, ignorant aristocrats. Hence the oddity of being offended by the suggestion that they are part of the “ruling class.”

As to whether the professions really hold all the power, once you get beyond the small family businesses and sole proprietorships that have always defined the bourgeoisie, who is actually running all the big corporations? Professionals: professional managers, professional accountants, professional lawyers, professional engineers. Ownership is usually dispersed, and rarely heard from. Who in turn, is running the government, and all the public services? Professionals: professional managers, professional teachers, professional social workers, professional academics. And whom do we elect, in theory to oversee them and keep them in line? Professionals—lawyers, mostly, with the odd manager, teacher, academic, or social worker.

It would be very funny, if it were not so serious.

Perhaps there is nothing intrinsically evil about a ruling class; or perhaps there is. The attitude of Jesus in the New Testament seems to make no allowances for the possibility that the ruling class of bureaucrats might be either good or necessary. It is, after all, a general principle that all individuals should be left as much as possible to rule themselves; this is the doctrine of human rights. There are great and honourable ethical traditions of this learned class: those of Confucius, Rabbinical Judaism, Hippocrates, the Jesuits, and so forth. But then, other classes can also claim their own great ethical traditions: those of chivalry, Calvin's “Protestant work ethic,” and so forth. The problem with any ruling class is that it seeks power over others, and those who join that ruling class will be those who seek power over others, and seeking power over others is probably intrinsically immoral, a violation of “do unto others....”

And there is definite reason to fear mischief from a structure in which the true ruling class is a matter for concealment.

A professional officer, near a small town in Belgium.

Unfortunately, over the past several centuries, more or less the opposite of what Marx, and indeed most others, have thought to have been happening, has been happening. The ruling class has been gathering more and more power to itself. In the pre-modern era, any tendency by the clerical Brahmin class to overreach could be countered by the landed class, the Ksatriyas. With their power over the military, they could intervene if they felt it necessary. The French Revolution, American Revolution, and English Revolution by and large took out this landed military class. The result was that the professional, clerical class had a much freer hand. Indeed, more or less the immediate result of both the French and the English revolutions was the seizure of the military power by the clerics, and its recasting on “professional” lines, with a professional officer corps: Cromwell's “New Model Army,” Napoleon's “Grand Armee.”

Lord Protector Cromwell, every inch the professional soldier, arrives at Parliament.

So, contrary to popular opinion, these revolutions may have reduced, rather than expanded, the freedom of the ordinary man. Regulations grew, and grew more strict: Cromwell's Puritans banned nearly everything, and Napoleon sought to regulate all phases of national life.

But these revolutions still left the Vaidyas, the merchant class, intact. The Marxist and Fascist revolutions of the Twentieth Century have been attempts to also strip all remaining power from the Vaidyas, the merchant class, aka the bourgeoisie, as well, and give them too to the professionals, leaving the professionals in that much more complete control.

It seems no coincidence, by the way, that the Communists and Fascists have done best in nations where a good education is traditionally most admired: in those most inclined in the first place to give power and prestige to the learned. China, Eastern Europe, then Catholic countries more than Protestant countries.

In the meantime, with or without a formal Marxist or Fascist revolution, the power of governments and their proportion of the GDP has been growing steadily, seemingly inexorably, worldwide throughout the Twentieth Century. Rules and regulations have continued to multiply.

Is there no escape?

Perhaps there is.

Up to this point, technological innovation has by and large only served to increase the power and prestige of the learned. Though new technologies did not necessarily come from the learned class, as technology improved, there tended to be more things to know, and so more need for learned sorts who knew how to operate them. So the professional class has grown richer, more powerful, and more numerous.

But in the end, the educated class exists due to a shortage of knowledge. What happens if knowledge instead is freely available to everyone, more or less at the click of a mouse?

That is what is happening with the Internet. The Internet will no doubt vastly increase the overall store of knowledge available, as did the invention of printing, but it also, vitally, and unlike the invention of printing, makes it instantly searchable. Increasingly, one can find the precise bit of knowledge one needs, right when one needs it.

There is perhaps, therefore, no longer a need for a professional class, really; everyone is capable of doing these things for themselves. Rather than needing to hire an expert on copyright law, who has studied the laws and casebooks and has them at least partly committed to memory, you can in principle get the relevant information, law and cases, for your situation quickly online. Rather than going to a doctor to have your symptoms diagnosed, you can use an expert system online. Knowing what your ailment is, you can fairly quickly become a more current expert on possible treatments than your doctor.

You may have noticed that Marx's third class, the proletatiat, the manual labourers, has largely disappeared in the most developed countries, instead of multiplying as he predicted, since he wrote. No doubt, in the early stages of the process, it looked as though they were growing. Technology instead made them largely obsolete, replacing much manual labour with machinery.

Just so, computers can replace much mental labour with machinery, probably over time making the professional class start to vanish.

We seem to be seeing this effect already. We are witnessing, it seems, the rapid decline and fall of the “legacy media,” which is to say, the “profession” of journalism. This makes sense: journalists are the first line of the keepers of the knowledge hoard, the daily disseminators of knowledge. They are no longer needed.

The rise of the Tea Party looks as though it is the beginning of a similar collapse in the power of professional politicians.

Teachers, too, are starting to feel the heat; Chris Christie in New Jersey is getting a lot of political milage out of challenging their unions.

Other, higher-level professions will probably follow. Real estate agents are about as useful now as elevator operators. General medical practitioners are only a shade better off, absent their legal monopoly on prescriptions—and the rising cost of health care should go far to bust that trust.

It might seem ironic that the world of the “knowledge professional” would collapse just at the moment when they seem to have reached the apex of their power, and everyone and their agent is striving to become a professional. But that is the way these things often are. Overreaching is part of the usual process. The French monarchy, too, fell just as it had seemingly consolidated everything under a Sun King, who could claim, “L'etat, c'est moi.”

If the ruling professional class actually falls, for the first time in human history, what will be left? And what will we all do for a living? That's a good question. Leonard Cohen may have been a true prophet in singing, back in the early nineties, “Democracy is coming—to the USA.” Who knows? We may see, for the first time, a direct, participatory democracy. The truth is, this is now for the first time ever truly feasible, thanks to the connectivity of the Internet. But that is secondary; the greater breakthrough would be a reversal of the trend towards greater government regulation.

Sainte Anne de Beaupre Miraculously Moved!

Typical of how poorly--and carelessly--the mainstream media treat religious subjects, this story incorrectly locates the basilica of Ste. Anne de Beaupre--hardly obscure-- in Trois Rivieres.

http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2010/11/14/16133451.html

Letters for Iraq

You can send letters of encouragement to the persecuted Catholics of Iraq. The Papal Nuncio to the UN has offered to deliver all letters by diplomatic pouch.


Please address your emails to the families to His Beatitude Emmanuel Delli, Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Baghdad at tonuncio@gmail.com. He will print out the emails and put them in the pouch.

Try Fitting THIS One on the Dashboard of Your Car

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/11/08/worlds-tallest-jesus-statue-completed/

Things Catholics Like: The Sistine Chapel

In 3D panorama, with sound track, and without other people in your way.

http://www.vatican.va/various/cappelle/sistina_vr/index.html

Weeping Image of the Virgin Reported in Windsor

http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2010/11/12/%E2%80%98weeping%E2%80%99-virgin-transferred-to-canadian-church/

I note that, although the couple who own the statue are Orthodox, the statue is being housed in a Catholic church. It sounds like a happy report of interdenominational cooperation.

Note neither the relevant Orthodox nor Catholic authorities are endorsing the claims. Decide for yourself.

Terhune's Dog Stories

The Dog that Won Through

This was once a syndicated newspaper feature.

http://www.barnaclepress.com/list.php?directory=Terhune

Los Angeles Evacuation Alert

More thoughts on the apparent missile firing off Los Angeles: I an way out of my depth when it comes to modern weaponry, but I thought to check online regarding the known capabilities of the North Korean Navy. (The celebrated Wolfram Alpha, by the way, turns out to be worthless, here. It admits of only one possible meaning for the word “submarine”: it comes with cold cuts). DPRK do have an established submarine fleet, and submarine manufacturing facilities as well. The submarines they have are supposed to be diesel-electric, not nuclear, limiting their range—but the listed range is still 9,000 miles. The actual distance from Pyongyang to Los Angeles is 5,946 miles. That makes it possible, with a little tinkering or extra fuel storage, to make the trip and get home, even without refuelling at sea, and even if North Korea has not significantly improved the submarine models they inherited from China and Russia, using their own research capabilities.

They are also not supposed to be equipped to launch missiles; that would be the crucial innovation.

It is interesting to note, in this regard, that the DPRK's latest and most up-to-date missile facility is actually build on the seacoast.

http://www.janes.com/news/defence/jdw/jdw080915_2_n.shtml

This seems a bit odd, since the US is a sea power, and this makes it rather more exposed than otherwise to spying and possible destruction. It makes more sense, though, if part of the research program is the fitting of missile launchers to submarines.

The point of the exercise, from North Korea's view, would not be just to warn off the US; North Korea's regime lives largely on weapons sales. The point is to advertise to anyone else who might want a first-strike capability against the US that the store is open...

Iran, of course, is not only on the potential buyers' list; they've been co-developing weapons with North Korea for years.

The expert from Jane's, the ruling authority on such matters, has been prepared to go on record saying it was a missile, not a jet contrail:

“Doug Richardson, the editor of Jane’s Missiles and Rockets, examined the video for the Times of London and said he was left with little doubt. 

"It’s a solid propellant missile," he told the Times. "You can tell from the efflux [smoke]." 

Richardson said it could have been a ballistic missile launched from a submarine or an interceptor, the defensive anti-missile weapon used by Navy surface ships. 

Some are suggesting it is incredible that anyone could fire a missile so near to one of the US's coasts without being detected or identified. But that would be the entire point of the exercise, wouldn't it—to do something shocking? History is jam-full of examples of official bureaucracies caught with their trousers about their ankles in such a wise. Two words: Pearl Harbor.

But then again, even if they saw the sub coming in and knew what was going to happen, what were they going to do? Depth-charge it? That's an act of war. Tell everyone what was happening? Panic in the streets of LA would not be pretty.

Bombs Away

On the off-chance you missed it, something mighty peculiar just happened off the coast of California. About 35 miles out from Los Angeles, someone launched a large missile, nicely visible from the city. US Armed Forces claim to know nothing about it.

A test-firing of something secret? No; obviously, if this were so, they would not fire it right off LA, and right at rush hour, 5 pm. Not just the worst thing possible for secrecy: there is an intrinsic danger here to the civilian population. Missiles can misfire. Especially experimental ones.

A private launch? But that was a very big missile, and fired at sea. A bit much for a hobbyist. And why do it? For publicity? Then we should expect someone to have come forward by now to take responsibility.

It seems obvious that somebody was trying to send somebody a message.

If the US Armed Forces were trying to put on a display, though, would there really be any need to stay quiet and play dumb about it? And if the point were to make an impression to a foreign power, why off LA? Why not off the coast of some other relevant power, even if not a hostile one, just to demonstrate reach—since the US probably has the muscle to do it? For example, if the point was to unnerve North Korea, why not fire the missile, if not off Pyongyang, off Tokyo, or Manila? If the point was to unnerve Iran, why not fire it off Dubai, or Mumbai? Indeed, since everyone already assumes the US can launch missiles from sea wherever and whenever they wish, why bother with such a demonstration in the first place?

Which opens the possibility that it is in fact Israel, demonstrating reach to Iran. But that would be crazy overkill—it doesn't take the ability to fire across the world to show you can fire across the street.

But if, on the other hand, someone else intended to send the US a message, this would be the obvious thing to do, wouldn't it? It also makes sense, if so, that the US Armed Forces are saying nothing. Suppose it was North Korea or Iran, or maybe China? This sort of demonstration of an ability to hit LA with a nuke at will would not exactly delight the general population. Mass panic would be more like it.

Of course, the military could have pretended it was one of theirs, to prevent such panic. But not if it was unexpected—it would take some time to get something coordinated. In the meantime, they'd have to first say “don't know, but clearly not threatening.” Which is exactly what they are saying.

Looks like they're working on a coordinated story, though. Late coverage seems to be converging on the suggestion that it “might” be simply a jet contrail.

See for yourself. Me, I don't buy it. I've seen a lot of jet contrails, and I've never seen one before where you could also see the bright glow of an afterburner.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GCgDKNEwyY

Now, logically, of the obvious possibilities, I'd put my money on North Korea. Iran would be closer to the East Coast, and they're less advanced in weaponry generally. China would probably not want to stir the pot, and probably does not need such a demonstration.

Someone is Doing Something

Things Catholics Like: Thuribles

Five Bishops Fly to the Ordinariate for England and Wales

Five Bishops Fly to the Ordinariate for England and Wales

The Madness of Psychology

Play that funky music, shepherd boy!

Psychology's claim to authority is that it is a “science.” Very well—that means it must stand or fall on the best empirical evidence. And the evidence is this: if psychology works, even if its use is not becoming any more widespread, we should see an overall decline of mental illness year-by-year as it increases in its knowledge.


What we have seen, instead, is a rapid growth in mental illness, and at exactly the time that we are relying more and more on psychology, in exactly the places where this is happening. It would be hard to imagine a more perfect example of a scientific theory being disproven. In fact, the evidence makes it clear that psychology is causing “mental illness.”


According to psychology, all major forms of mental illness are incurable. The “symptoms” can perhaps be “controlled” with “medicine,” but the prognosis is always “no cure.” Just the opposite, in fact: if you have any of the major “illnesses,” or even chronic depression, the prognosis is for it to simply get worse until you die.


What could be a clearer admission of failure? To make it worse, and to make the point clearer, these “mental illnesses” were commonly understood to be only temporary in most cases before psychology, and still are thought to be temporary in places where psychology is not used.

“Cross cultural and historical studies indicate that chronic mental illness is a recent phenomenon of Westernized countries. Recent studies by the World Health Organization show that the rate of recovery from severe mental illness is much better in third world countries than in Western industrialized countries. Historical evidence points out that the rates of recovery were much higher during the 1830-40's in this country when there was a much more optimistic view of recovery."

http://www.power2u.org/articles/recovery/people_can.html


So the plain scientific evidence is that psychology is causing and sustaining mental “illness.” The worst possible thing you can do, if you show any relevant symptoms, is to go anywhere near a psychiatrist, psychologist, or clinical facility.

Proposed template for dart board.

One further proof that it is all bogus is that psychologists themselves readily say so. Ask them about anything psychology held to be true as recently as twenty years ago, and they will openly scorn it. All nonsense, it turns out. Twenty years ago, of course, they had the same attitude towards everything they believed forty years ago. Real sciences change in details, but build on a foundation that remains. Psychology works instead as a series of fads; each in turn wholly disproven in time. It takes a supreme leap of faith in opposition to reason to suppose that, having always been wrong before, nevertheless, this time they are right.


For psychology to be actually making “mental illness” worse, it must be actively blocking the real cure. What might that be? The answer is perfectly obvious: real “psychology,” that is, literally, “systematic knowledge of the soul.” Religion. Psychology sets itself up more or less in direct opposition to religion, generally positively avoiding any religious references. Not scientific. You'd have a better chance of hearing about religious truth by chatting with any man on the street than by going to a therapy session.


Spiritual troubles occur in the spirit. This would be obvious, indeed self-evident, if psychology had not gotten things so screwed up.


Even if depression or schizophrenia are caused by something your parents did to you in childhood—and this is likely to be largely so—simply talking about your childhood is unlikely to do much for you. The problem with the past is that you cannot change it. The future is much more useful. In the end, your family is just a random bunch of people you happened to grow up with. Contrary to much, even Christian, popular belief, there is nothing sacred about the family.


If you want to read a nice, family-friendly text, stay as far as possible away from the New Testament. Here's what Jesus has to say about families: “He who does not despise his father and mother is not worthy of me.” “Let the dead bury their own dead.” “What have I to do with you, woman?” (To his mother. The Virgin Mary.)


“Codependency”? That concept is malicious jive. It is a way for the unrighteous to persecute the blessed for their righteousness. If the concept is legitimate, then Mother Theresa of Calcutta, St. Francis of Assisi, Kwannon, Jesus Christ, all the angels and saints are simply “codependent” and “mentally ill.” No good Christian can endorse the concept of “codependency.” Indeed, no good person can endorse the concept of “codependency.” Here the psychiatrist speaks directly in the devil's voice.


The whole “chemical imbalance” thesis is perfectly tautological. We know that how we think changes our brain chemistry; so there is no way to distinguish cause and effect. Wrong tree, dawg.

Riding the tiger of emotions: Korean shamanic drawing.

Nor is there any value in discussing fuzzy inner feelings. Let's look at the scientific evidence for the thesis that mental illness comes from not talking about our feelings. As we can easily see, some cultures are much more open to expressing feelings than others: the Koreans are far more openly emotional than the Japanese, the Irish are far more open than the English, the French are more open than the Germans—these being, otherwise, rather comparable nations on other factors. If Freud and the “fuzzy feelings” folks are right, this should be manifested by a significantly lower incidence of mental illness in the open than in the closed partner in each pair.


I gather nobody has done a really systematic study—oddly. But when the same diagnostic survey was tried in both Germany and France, the rate of mental illness in France turned out to be double that in Germany.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5111202


I have also read that the rate of schizophrenia in the Irish is unusually high.


Again, you would expect women, who are generally more inclined to talk about their feelings, to have significantly lower rates of mental illness than men. But no, it turns out their rates are somewhat higher:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_disorder


So the theory is plainly and simply wrong. It is surely just as likely that talking a lot abut your emotions, by focusing your attention on them, makes them stronger. If your emotions are unpleasant ones like sadness, anxiety, shame, or anger, this would then be distinctly a Bad Thing To Do.


It may also be a bad thing because it is unhealthily egocentric, trapping you in the narrow view that is causing you depression, as opposed to learning to be more “philosophical” about things. Consider the “Prayer of St. Francis”:

O Divine Master, 

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; 

to be understood, as to understand;

Isn't this the opposite of the psychotherapeutic enterprise? And might this not actually be better advice?

You know Buddhism; you know the Four Noble Truths? The last thing the Buddha would have advised was to get in touch with your feelings. Feelings are cravings; that's exactly what they are. They are exactly where dukkha—“ill being,” very much including what is called “mental illness”--comes from.

Jesus, too, tells us to get our emotions under wraps, not to dwell on them. If we lust after a woman—that is adultery. If we in anger call our brother “fool”--that is as bad as murdering him. If we worry--”take no thought for the morrow; sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”

Hmm—pop pseudo-science that has already been disproven, or the wisdom of the ages? Tough choice.


I do believe in “art therapy,” though. Except there is no such thing—all art is “art therapy.” It takes the bad feelings, and transforms them into something different, and something meaningful. As Wordsworth put it: “emotion recollected in tranquillity.” Painting, sketching, sculpting, poetry, singing, playing an instrument, telling a story, acting, all the traditional arts. All soul-restoring, and time-tested, ways to sublimate troublesome feelings. Failing that, “art appreciation” works too, though not so well. “Whenever the evil spirit from God overpowered Saul, David would play on the lyre and Saul would feel better for the evil spirit would leave him.”


But if Saul had simply made his peace with God—he would have been cured.

Depression and Memory and So Forth

Yahweh, how about best two out of three?

A good friend writes me about his depression.

My fundamental starting point in all this sort of thing is simply this: forget everything you have heard or read from either psychology or psychiatry. Really, they have absolutely no clue what they are talking about, and never will. Do I need to explain why, or how we know this? Suffice to say that the notion of “mental illness” is a metaphor mistaken for a fact. And, as a metaphor, it does not fit. Not to mention that the idea of a “science of the soul” is at least as absurd as asking how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. (Forty-two, by the way).

This being so, I am of course fascinated with the question of what depression really is. I'm always half-listening for clues. The same is true, to a lesser extent, of everything we currently call “mental illness.”

Alzheimer's, for example. I believe that, in Alzheimer's, nothing is gone. This is proven by the fact that those who are senile can have periods of perfect lucidity. This could not be so if it were a matter of something missing from the mind. My best guess is that senility is just a movement of the attention from this world to the next, in preparation for death.

Now on to depression and memory. There is a link. Those I know who commonly suffer from clinical depression also seem to have significantly stronger memories than those who do not. They tend to remember many details from their own childhood, for example.

But if so, what does it mean? There are many possibilities.

One is that depression comes from a vivid memory of childhood trauma, that it requires having been abused as well as having a clear memory of it. Indeed, traumatic experiences, Freud to the contrary, tend to improve the memory, so the two may go together. Could well be. This is what psychiatry and psychology currently believe, apparently—that depression is related to childhood trauma.

I think it is also possible that the association of depression with childhood abuse is secondary to the association of depression with a family history of alcoholism. Alcoholism is often a form of self-treatment for depression, I believe. So, if whatever causes depression runs in families, alcoholism is likely to run in the same family. And alcoholics are in turn very likely to get abusive when drunk.

I incline, though, to a different explanation. Medieval thinkers saw memory as the essential mental faculty: memory built soul. (So does suffering). Hence, it may be, simply, that those with stronger memories have stronger souls, and vice versa. Put in religious terms, they are more commonly in contact with, more aware of, the spiritual world. This seems to fit with two other observations I have of the clinically depressed: that they are invariably unusually sincere types, even naive about the ways of the world; and that they invariably have a genuine interest in religion, albeit they are rarely practising. It also fits with another observation commonly made by others: that depression comes with intelligence and creativity. Both are also expressions of soul. Studies have shown that the overwhelming majority of working artists and writers are depressives.

The amusing corollary to this, which I believe, is that those who are not depressive are simply not aware of what is really going on. Depressives are smarter than non-depressives. This is why it is so hard to get rid of it through a “talking therapy”: the doctor probably cannot teach the patient anything he does not already know better than the doctor.

But why would a bigger soul lead to depression? Simple: because this material, social world is not what it should be. The more one is aware of the spiritual world, the more one is aware of the contrast, of how far this present world falls short.

How can this not be so? How are we ever aware of evil without an awareness of good? Of sadness without an awareness of joy? Indeed, as evil is simply a deprivation of the good, so sadness is perhaps only a deprivation of joy. So, if we are of a mind to see nothing of value in this world, as in depression, that has to imply another world somewhere of which we are somehow aware—and a far better world.

What Jesus consistently called the Kingdom of Heaven—and spoke of not only as an afterlife, but as something that is “within you” now, like leaven in a loaf, at least for the “poor in spirit.”

This implies, of course, that all depression is incipiently “manic depression.”

If so, the best cure for depression is to turn away from this dull social world and towards the bright light of the spirit. Unfortunately, this is the exact opposite of what psychiatry and psychology seek to do. Instead, their every effort is strained towards turning the “sufferer” away from any spiritual interests, and towards a more complete commitment to the mundane desert of daily life. The idea is to stop this evil, destructive “rumination” and get them more friends.

So depression is caused by an unusual awareness of the other world, of heaven. But I also suspect that memory specifically is in some way a key to this, that it is a doorway from this world into the spirit. What exists now is what is physically present to our senses; what is physically present to our senses is always and only what exists now. As these things slip into memory, they are also, necessarily, slipping into the spirit, becoming spiritualized. Hence, the memory is, par excellance, the doorway into the spirit. From our memories, we also conjure whatever perception we have of the future. From the future, whatever intimations we have of an afterlife. Not to mention the objects of all thought.

So the need to develop and strengthen the memory is a spiritual necessity.

Related to this: I have always thought that the story of Adam and Eve is not primarily history, but psychology. For example, in the beginning, according to Genesis, there were giants on the earth, and people lived for a much longer time than they do today. Exactly so—is that not just how the world appears in early childhood? Adults are giants to us—if we return later to the scene of our early childhood, we are amazed at how everything has shrunk while we were away; where once those buildings were as tall as the Tower of Babel. And for our elders, time seems frozen—old people were always, or almost always, old, and seem almost eternal. It is only when we get old ourselves that we understand old age not as a permanent state of being, but as a threshold we cross for only a few moments on our way elsewhere.

Noah's flood, in turn, is the flood of time and of the external sensory world, causing for most of us and for most of our perceptions a general forgetting. Noah's ark is precisely the ark of memory, which retains an essence of all the things worth preserving in our sense perceptions, and carries them along past death into the spiritual world.

Building the ark.

The original sin, accordingly, is in some real sense something we all do, soon after the point of first consciousness. This is why we are all tainted by it. When we first attain self-consciousness, our first instinct is to see ourselves as all-important, as like gods, little centres of our own universes, and, when slighted, our first impulse is to murder our brother. Growing up, when it happens, is growing past these original impulses. Loading the ark of memory is the first, essential, step.

Let's fast forward in our history of salvation to the Beatitudes. Are they not, frankly and plainly, God's DSM, a precise definition of the phenomenon formerly, falsely, known as “depression”?

3"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

5Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

6Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

7Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

8Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

9Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.

10Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11"Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.

12Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

The DSM of psychiatry and psychology gets hung up on the mourning part, because that is what makes it seem most like a “disease,” and that is what they are looking for. That's where the money comes from. But really, the thing itself is much more complex. For example, studies show, not only that depression runs in families, but that it runs in families by marriage. Depressives are extremely likely to marry fellow depressives.

This implies, among other things, that depression, if it is an illness, is in fact a contagious illness. I believe this is quite true, and so it is hard to fault people for being afraid of and trying to shun people who are depressed. Instinctively, at least, they know that depressives are dangerous to them. Depression is contagious precisely because it is the truth. It is a bit difficult to unlearn the truth once one has discovered it. Kind of like the knowledge of good and evil, in that regard.

Worse, depressives are called on to evangelize that truth: to let their light shine, like a city on the hill. This is profoundly socially subversive, and always will be.

"Blessed are the poor in spirit."

Here, then, is how to spot a depressive, or a real Christian—they being the same thing—at a cocktail party:

1. They are “poor in spirit”--that is, un-self-centred. They do not seek physical possessions, and they do not seek attention to themselves. They are not troubled when the spotlight is on others.

2. They are meek—without pretensions. “Low self-esteem” is the unfortunately negative way this is portrayed by psychology.

3. They hunger and thirst for righteousness—they have a strong sense of right and wrong, a strong conscience. They will commonly place this above self-interest.

4. They are merciful—in general, empathic towards others. They're the ones who are still there when you hurt, or who will gravitate to others needing help.

5. They are pure in heart—without guile. They do not “play games.” They do not particularly care what others think of them, and they do not try to create a false impression.

6. They are peacemakers—in general, they do not like to compete, and are not driven by competition with their neighbours.

They commonly have experiences of being persecuted—here the abuse indeed comes in. According to Jesus, though, it is not just the fact of being abused, but of being abused for one's righteousness. Commonly, they have been abused by parents, superiors, therapists, or peers precisely for being especially conscientious as a child, then as an adult. This is the way of the world. Those who have things to conceal fear and despise the light.

These “depressives” are exactly the people Jesus was speaking to. They are also exactly the people the Buddha was speaking to—there are similar passages in the Buddhist canon. To be “depressive” is to be spiritual.

Hence, the troublesome symptoms of “depression” are no more and no less than St. John of the Cross's “Dark Night of the Soul.” They are the call to the spiritual pilgrimage. When they persist, they are the experience of being caught in the doorway, not sure which way to move. Tragically, this is the situation more or less forced on sufferers by modern psychiatry/psychology, and by the social world in general, so that what was once a temporary disorientation on the threshold of something unspeakably wonderful has become for most a permanent “disability.”

I noted that depressives I know tend to be sincerely interested in religion, but not practising. I think becoming fully practising is the key. This is not easy; it takes profound courage: it is rather like jumping off a cliff, off of all solid ground. There is a reason why it is called “the leap of faith.” The fundamental necessity is to once and for all accept and affirm that “this” world is a crock, and that only God matters. St. John puts it, “live as though there are only you and God in the world.” Nothing really makes any sense on the conventional understanding of the world. Totally bollocks. But everything makes sense if everything that happens to you is a direct dialogue with God, God trying to tell you something.

Now a word about other “mental illnesses”: I was struck while in Korea with how the symptoms of a vocation as a mudang—a spirit medium or shaman—are exactly those that cause a diagnosis as “schizophrenic” in the West. Consider that: in Canada, you are permanently disabled and put on drugs for life. In Korea, you simply have a new job. Surely the Korean interpretation is demonstrably better and more correct? It is psychiatry, again, that is creating the “illness.”

In Christian terms, of course, shamanism equates to demonic possession. Shamans themselves understand this, and are quite clear about it: one becomes a shaman because one is possessed by a spirit too powerful to be exorcised.

The preferable alternative, then, is exorcism.

Have you ever wondered how Christianity, a small, hated, persecuted cult, grew so rapidly to take over the Roman Empire? Have you ever wondered how Judaism, before it, gained such prestige, allowing it to survive when all other ancient religions have died away?

The matter, according to many accounts, was quite simple and empirical. The Jews were the experts at exorcism. They were able to drive out demons that no other known technique would. And the Christians seemed to inherit this ability. Monotheism was the antidote to demonic possession.

St. Benedict performing an exorcism.

It would be still today, if we tried it. It still is, in the Muslim world. It is interesting that, currently, and since the Second World War, rates of mental illness of all kinds have been skyrocketing in the developed world. Thirty years ago, I recall, the rates were already four times what they had been prewar. They have only been growing since. It is possible, of course, that this is due to more accurate reporting; but that is not the most obvious explanation. The most obvious explanation is that this phenomenon is simply inversely tracking the decline in religion, which has been equally remarkable over the same period; and the rise of psychiatry in its place.

There is a moral dimension to all this, of course. It is not that the insane, or the depressed, are less moral than most—just the reverse, actually. But guilt is often an important barrier to our healing. Most commonly, we resist a full conversation with God because we are afraid of him, because of something wrong that we remember we have done. Memory again.

To Shakespeare, who was after all one of the greatest geniuses who ever lived, the matter was plain. I just finished rereading Shakespeare's MacBeth, which is largely a study in madness. Some demonic possessions, true, have nothing to do with personal guilt. But at least some forms of psychosis, like MacBeth's and Lady MacBeth's, are caused by remembering doing something that you now deeply regret. Having murdered Duncan, they descend progressively through the gates of memory into madness. They are hounded, through memory, with the realities of the spiritual world. They are obsessed, in the true literal sense, with the ghosts of Duncan and Banquo.

I have seen something like this in full schizophrenics I have known. Unlike depressives, they seem to have engaged in classically immoral behaviour at some point in their past. Usually sex, because otherwise they'd be in prison instead of a psychiatric facility.

I recall reading a book on the death penalty in Florida, which mentioned that just about everyone on death row was apparently clinically psychotic. Interesting. Were they insane when they committed their crimes? Unlikely—it would have been hard to premeditate and plan, and that's required for the death penalty. One of the men was a killer for the Mafia—that's business, and they're not going to leave it to a madman. Were they driven crazy by the thought of their impending death? Maybe—but that does not seem to match with so many accounts of other people facing death with hope and clarity. Is it not, logically, the notion of facing death specifically with a guilty conscience that has driven them mad? QED.

An absolutely classic fantasy of the psychotic, by the way, seems to be that God is out to get them. They imagine God devouring their innards, like Prometheus, or penetrating their minds with probes or eating their brains out of their bare skull. Paranoia is a more generic form of the same thing—some alien or American or UN or Jewish organization behind the universe is out to track them down and make them pay.

Obviously not a good place to be. Such people are already in hell. The solution, again, is to turn to religion and to God, and ask for forgiveness. Because their consciences are more damaged, it is harder for them. Psychiatry and psychology make it much harder still.

More to come.

The Catholic Vote

Apparently, there has been a steady swing of Catholic voters from the Democratic to the Republican Party over the past few US elections:

2006 - 42% Republican
2008 - 44% Republican
2010 - 54% Republican

Catholics are not much heeded as a voting block, but they are a huge one, and this swing is historic. Not long ago, it was instinctive to pull the level for the straight Democratic ticket if you were Catholic.

The same thing is happening in Canada: used to be automatic to vote Liberal if you were Catholic; now the Conservatives are increasingly the Catholic party.

Say It--Just Say the Word: It Was a _Catholic_ Church

Why does the NY Times seem to consciously avoid the fact that the church recently attacked in Baghdad was Catholic?

http://www.getreligion.org/2010/11/massacre-in-a-generic-iraqi-church/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+getreligion/DmXm+(GetReligion)

Zacchaeus in the Sycamore Tree

This week's Gospel was another of those knee-slappers. Jesus just keeps 'em coming.

Zacchaeus in the tree.

Luke 19

Zacchaeus the Tax Collector

 1 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.

 5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” 6 So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly.

 7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.”

 8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”

 9 Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

Okay, so picture this—Zacchaeus, the chief tax collector for the city of Jericho, and a wealthy man, is significantly shorter than average height. Isn't this already a little amusing, vaguely cartoonish? A comic reversal of expectations—the “big shot” is physically small. And isn't his enthusiasm about seeing Jesus also comic? You would think such an important official would have more important business than to be out in the street for a passing parade. Can't you just imagine him trying excitedly to jump a few times to see over the backs of others?

Now imagine one of the least loved and richest citizens of the city, presumably at least middle-aged, climbing a tree to watch this fellow from Nazareth passing by. Isn't this a bit beneath the expected dignity of, say, a Paul Martin, a Gordon Brown, a Jim Flaherty, or even your local banker?

Now, consider: Zacchaeus is sitting up in the tree—absurd image, but there it is--and Jesus comes by. Jesus stops and calls to him by name, and tells him to come down. In reaction, Zaccheus—this important customs official, and not really knowing “who Jesus was”-- immediately scrambles down as he is told. That's not all--he promises on the spot to give half of what he has to the poor, and to repay fourfold anyone he might have cheated.

Is he so impressed that Jesus knew his name? But really, why? Zacchaeus was obviously well-known in Jericho—everyone recognizes him, and everyone asssumes that Jesus too knows who he is, for they are scandalized by Jesus's favour. After all it is hard to imagine any itinerant preacher, Son of God or not, approaching a well-dressed, middle-aged man sitting in a tree without asking those nearby who the hell that is. And those around him would know.

There's more. Why doesn't Zacchaeus know whether he has cheated anybody? And, if he does not know, how can he promise to pay all back fourfold? If he does not know, how can he know this does not amount to more than he is worth?

No—sorry, this all not what it appears. Zacchaeus is not, as one might suppose, as the story seems at first to say, a repentant sinner. After all, given his demonstrable impetuousness here, can we really assume that he does, afterwards, follow through on his promises? Yet Jesus declares him saved, right here, right now, without yet having done so.

The essence of Zacchaeus is that he is “in the world, but not of it.” As his stature first suggests to us, he is the eternal child, in a world of adults. He lives only in the present moment, amazed by everything, heedless of either past or future. That is why he does not really know if he has cheated anyone, and does not think or care whether he will be able to fulfill his promise or not. Being without guile, he does not consider his dignity in climbing a tree; similarly, he has clearly not cared overly much for popular opinion in becoming a tax collector.

It is this childlike absence of guile, this alienation from the social world and its standards, this wholeness of heart, and not any change of heart, that marks Zacchaeus as saved. Not surprisingly, the name “Zacchaeus,” in Hebrew, means “pure.”

And one can understand, instinctively. Is he not, instinctively, lovable?

Tradition has it that he later became the first bishop of Caesaria.

How's Your Basic Cultural Literacy?

http://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/story.php?title=basic-cultural-literacy-mother-goose

The Iranian Bomb

Courtesy CIA World Factbook.

Reading an in-depth article on the Iranian nuclear issue. It looks more serious than I had supposed.

Among those most worried about an Iranian bomb—let's be clear about this—are the Arab countries of the Persian, aka Arabian, Gulf. They are very small countries, with very small populations, flat as pancakes with no natural defences, and very, very rich. Iran is very big and very close by. If Iran gets le bombe, they warn, they will have no choice. They will have to cater to Iran's whims, in hopes of not being devoured, as they have been by Persia many times in their history.

Iran, on the other hand, will have every incentive to try sooner or later to take them over with conventional forces. The money is so good. Should they fail, given that they have the bomb, as well as strong natural defences, not much bad is going to happen to them. Should they succeed, they get control of the majority of the world's oil supply, with all the financial and strategic benefits this implies. A firm hand on the necks of Europe and the developed and developing nations of the Far East.

The alternative is almost as troubling: the little oil-rich states of the Middle East will all have to get their own nuclear arsenals, in order to forestall Iran. They have the financial ability, at least, to do so. But this probably means a Saudi bomb, a Kuwaiti bomb, a Qatari bomb, an Emirati bomb, maybe even an Omani and a Bahraini bomb. So much for nuclear non-proliferation. And you've suddenly multiplied the likelihood of some Islamist terrorist organization getting their hands on a bomb, clean or dirty, exponentially.

The possible elimination of Israel, really, is the least of America's worries; but this too looks ominous. There is no Mutually Assured Destruction here to stay Iran's hand. Even if Israel retained the ability to strike back—which it would—Israel would be gone in a puff of smoke from only a handful of well-placed bombs. Iran could be wounded, but not so destroyed. It is just possible the prestige of having taken out Israel might be worth it; and there is also the calculation that, even if a few Israeli subs retained the ability to strike back, they might not at this point. Their command structure would be gone, they would have no nation to return to—their own self-interest as well as objective morality would argue for quietly heading instead for the nearest friendly port.

So let's review: Ahmadinejad has within his sights control over all the oil wealth and plain wealth wealth of the Persian Gulf, great strategic influence over all of the developed world outside North America, and perhaps Russia, and indeed also over most of the undeveloped world. Meantime, he takes out Israel.

Seems as though, by this point, and given that by this point the counterbalancing prestige of the US in the region would be roughly zero Kelvin, his prestige could be great enough to become the acknowledged leader, formally or informally, of the Muslim world, stretching from Gibraltar to New Guinea. The new Iran, a democratic-theocratic Muslim government, seems primed to be an ideological model for such a new caliphate.

Imagine that: a radical Islamist world power. Perhaps even the dominant world power. Allah is great.

Gentlemen, we could be looking at the end of the American empire.

Given the stakes, does the current US administration have the courage to try to take out Iran's nuclear capabilities, by whatever means necessary? Do they even have the courage to let Israel do so? It seems a bad time to have a president like Obama in office, and a bad time for the US to be maxing all its credit cards.

The gameboard.

In the face of these concerns, Bush's invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan look a lot smarter than many ever imagined. I suspect he knew all along what he was doing—it's all too perfect. Saddam himself, let alone his weapons of mass destruction, might have been an alibi. Bush was surrounding Iran with US military, and US military bases—to the East, in Afghanistan, and to the West, in Iraq. Check and mate. At the same time, American and Iraqi forces are now positioned to oppose any land invasion from Persia into the Gulf—they will have to come by sea, and that's a lot more difficult for a land power facing a sea power; not to mention the high-tech Gulf Arab air forces. Money for good equipment, they've got.

I note that Irbil, in Northern Iraq, population just under one million, just opened in September a new airport with the fourth-longest runway in the world. It's a civil airport. Infrastructure is a good thing, but it is a bit hard to see why a mere regional centre, in a nation not exactly on the world tourist map, needs this kind of capacity in the near future. Oddly enough, though, the runway is large enough to land all the USAF's largest cargo planes. At speed. They are within about a hundred clicks of the Iranian border. They are also directly across from the one major pass in the mountains that separate Northern Iraq from Northern Iran—one of only four highway crossings along the entire Iraq-Iran border.

I suspect similar airports are opening elsewhere in Iraq, and in Afghanistan. Similar huge airports are certainly under construction in Dubai and Qatar. Dubai's will be the world's largest. Together, they seem like a necklace of peals around Iran's neck.

This suggests that the US authorities do have a fix on the significance of the problem before them. I suspect they have been working hard, with Brits, Gulf Arabs, and Israelis, on other options: on cyber attacks on Iran, on supporting the Green Revolutionaries, who seem, frankly, to have been coordinated very largely from Dubai. If any of these other initiatives succeed, well and good; the need for possibly massive bloodshed will have been avoided. The evident strength of these attacks—so great that they have made the world news, although the government of Iran itself would probably want to suppress all knowledge of them—shows the seriousness of intent behind them.